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Finra Fines Oppenheimer $1.4 Million for Allowing Abuse of Penny Stock Trades

By Brian Monroe

The nation's largest private securities regulator penalized Oppenheimer & Co. more than $1.4 million for violations related to penny stock trades, a fine that could spur smaller firms to review for similar problems. The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (Finra) said that the New York-based firm violated anti-money laundering (AML) rules by failing to report suspicious trades of low-priced stocks between August 2008 and September 2009. Oppenheimer did not have the controls in place to see that clients were purchasing blocks of penny stocks, quickly liquidating them and then transferring the proceeds out of the accounts, Finra said. While the firm...

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